This continues a series adapted from the book, “A Port Oneida Collection,” Volume 1 of the twopart set, “Oral History, Photographs, and Maps from the Sleeping Bear Region,” produced by Tom Van Zoeren in partnership with Preserve Historic Sleeping Bear. Here we continue with the Baker Farm, at the north end of Port Oneida Road, next to Camp Kohahna. We left off three weeks ago with a couple of stories from Jack & Lucille Barratt. Here’s one more from Jack, from the shoal north of Pyramid Point: “One time we were lifting (fishing nets) in the fall. Everett Olsen was with us, Nels (Olsen) and I — and a northeaster came up and we had to drop the nets overboard and take off for shore. Nels could skull (work a single long oar from a notch in the back). Of course I was an experienced rower, having been in the Coast Guard — and Everett was just a landlubber! He had no idea even how to row. In these seas he’d go to dip his oar, and he wouldn’t get it in the water, even; and he’d go over backwards in the bottom of the boat. I remember Nels saying, ‘Listen! Watch Jack, you damn land-lubber, you!’ We headed right for Pyramid. We didn’t try to come down here (to the Baker Farm) , so we could get to shore as soon as possible. And when we got on the beach we just fell on our faces on the sand and recuperated.” ~~~ “Anybody could build a skiff. To build a skiff you just make up your forms — You had three or four of those forms. And you got a 16- or 18-foot, 12- or 14-inchwide piece of cedar board (which is rot-resistant) ¾ of an inch thick. And you tied the back together with rope, and you went around and tied the bow together as tight as you could get it with rope. . . Well you see they’re taking the shape of a boat already with those forms that set on (sawhorses). And there’s a center-piece plank that set on these horses to keep anything from moving sideways . . .” – Jack. White pine or oak were also sometimes used.
Although many men made their own, Henry and Ernie Anderson, the bachelor brothers from a farm up M-22 past Lake Narada, made a lot of the skiffs around the area. “They made beautiful skiffs.” ~~~ “Oh, I imagine it was in 1944 or ’45, because it was during the war when you couldn’t buy anything,” Jack recollected, noting that he and his father-in-law Fred Baker made most of the beams themselves with their portable buzzsaw rig when they built their sheep barn.
Jack had designed the building. “Grandpa (Fred Baker) and I poured the foundation ourselves — mixed the cement and made the forms up. Ole Thoreson came up & helped to shingle the barn. I think we ended up with 60, 70 ewes at one time. Yeah, we had quite a herd.”
